Amazon Alexa

Some 5 years ago, on November 6th 2014, Alexa saw the light of day. She moved into our homes, became part of millions of families, and changed profoundly how we interact with technology at home: simply by voice.

They are soon eight and five, while our youngest became three in May. Still, our voice assistants Siri, Alexa and Google delight us continuously with new features. One of the recent 'features' came to some of us as a surprise: humans are listening into (some of) our...

The picture above says it all. As you can tell by the slightly yellowish color of the rain gauge, this post is obviously a long-term review. Let's have a look, how the Netatmo Weather Station, an Additional Indoor module, the Rain Gauge, and the Wind Gauge performed...

Let’s examine the strengths and weaknesses of Siri, Alexa, and Google by comparing their configuration options, voice commands, and smart home features for our Philips Hue lights. The world leader in lighting and the smart assistants of the biggest tech companies, can it get...

In this post, we will set up Alexa to talk to your Philips Hue lights. We will cover a quick basic setup, as well as additional Alexa features to get the most out of your Philips Hue setup. You will also find all the voice commands and...

Last year we successfully ducked compiling the endless list of Easter eggs, which are hidden inside Siri, Alexa, and Google. Rather than spoiling the Easter egg fun - which basically every other website sadly does - we tried to keep it fun and just helped a bit with...

Have you ever wondered, which of our super assistants supports our Nanoleaf Aurora best? Let's examine the strengths and weaknesses of Siri, Alexa, and Google by comparing their configuration options, voice commands, as well as their smart home features for our Nanoleaf Aurora. We've already...

In this post we will look into all the Alexa music commands, to enjoy all the music services supported by your Amazon Echo. We will cover basic volume and playback commands, as well as tips and tricks how to play and manage your favorite music. You'll find...

In this post, we will set up Alexa to talk to your Nanoleaf Aurora. We will cover a quick basic setup, as well additional Alexa features to get the most out of your setup. If you have not already set up and configured your Aurora with the...

Only 4 years ago, on November 6th 2014, Alexa saw the light of day. She moved into our homes, became part of millions of families, and changed profoundly how we interact with technology at home: simply by voice. Let's celebrate Alexa's birthday and look into the four exciting years of our...

It's this time of the year, which lets us think of Easter egg hunts. Not only the real Easter eggs but also the virtual ones, well hidden in our smart assistants: Siri, Alexa, and Google. An Easter egg in computer software is an intentional inside joke or hidden feature,...

We are at the crossroads. We use our smart assistants mostly for listening to music, but how musical are our assistants actually? How to decide, whether Alexa, Siri or Google fits better to our musical preferences? And if we have decided already, how can we get the most out...

It must have been a strange moment for Mr. Colin M. Angle, CEO of iRobot, when he presumably announced summer 2017 his plans to sell the mapping data share maps for free with customer consent of his newest robotic vacuum cleaner (Roomba) models to one of the big three (Amazon, Apple, Google)....

This Valentine's post is a story of appreciation, harmony and ultimately ... love. In this post we are going to connect Alexa with our Logitech Harmony Hub, only to find one of the loveliest integrations of voice control. Promise. On top we will create a "candlelight dinner" routine for Alexa, to...

Let's start this post with an interview ... Me: Alexa, how are you?
Alexa: I'm excellent. I've got dinosaurs on my mind. If I was around back when they roamed the Earth, I wonder what they would have asked me. Maybe, "Alexa, what's that massive fireball streaking across the sky?" Me: Alexa, how...